[Commlist] New book: The Sensuous Cinema of Wong Kar-wai

*Now available from Hong Kong University Press:*

*/The Sensuous Cinema of Wong Kar-wai: Film Poetics and the Aesthetic of 
Disturbance/* (Second Edition) by Gary Bettinson

Paperback, 204pp.ISBN: 978-988-8900-82-4

*Description:*

The widely acclaimed films of Wong Kar-wai are characterized by their 
sumptuous yet complex visual and sonic style. This study of Wong’s 
filmmaking techniques uses a poetics approach to examine how form, 
style, narration, characterization, genre, and other artistic elements 
work together to produce dynamic effects on the audience. Bettinson 
argues that Wong’s films – from /Days of Being Wild/ and /Chungking 
Express/ to /In the Mood for Love/ and /The Grandmaster/ – are permeated 
by an aesthetic of sensuousness and “disturbance” achieved through 
techniques such as narrative disruptions, jarring cuts, the blocking of 
facial access, and other complicating strategies. The effect is to jolt 
the viewer out of complete aesthetic absorption. Each of the chapters 
focuses on a single aspect of Wong’s filmmaking. The book also discusses 
Wong’s influence on other filmmakers in Hong Kong and around the world.

This tenth-anniversary edition of /The Sensuous Cinema of Wong 
Kar-wai/ includes a substantial new afterword bringing the story of 
Wong’s career up to date (including reflections on the Mainland Chinese 
drama /Blossoms Shanghai/). Bettinson revisits and extends the arguments 
of the first edition, surveys the recent key debates on Wong’s 
filmmaking, and introduces fresh lines of critical investigation.

*Endorsements:*

“Seldom has the sensuous been subjected to such a scientifically 
rigorous and yet moving account as Gary Bettinson’s analysis of Wong 
Kar-wai. Chapter by chapter, the logic of specific choices underpinning 
Wong’s cinema produces a sense of revelation perfectly complementing the 
intense pleasures of watching the films. In this expanded edition, 
Bettinson focuses on the actor’s work, a stroke of genius for 
understanding an oeuvre where body language and gesture are so crucial.”

*—Chris Berry*, King’s College London

“In this essential study of acclaimed filmmaker Wong Kar-wai, Gary 
Bettinson exquisitely captures the director’s cinematic sensorium and 
digs deep below a seductive visual surface to uncover a creative 
roughness that disturbs narrative and generic expectations. Bettinson’s 
perceptive analyses of individual films conjure the sounds, sights, 
smells, tastes, and textures of Wong’s Hong Kong. This book convincingly 
demonstrates how Wong Kar-wai took the international festival circuit by 
storm and why he made a lasting impact on global film aesthetics.  Three 
cheers for this updated edition!”

*—**Gina Marchetti*, author of /Citing China: Politics, Postmodernism, 
and World Cinema/ (2018)

“Not only the best—and indisputably the most ambitious—monograph on Wong 
Kar-Wai’s work and work practice, but also a model of grounded 
historical poetics. /The Sensuous Cinema of Wong Kar-Wai/ shows 
Bettinson to be a careful writer and sophisticated thinker with broad 
and deep knowledge of film culture, theory and aesthetics. His book 
represents a substantial contribution to screen poetics, a touchstone 
work thoroughly informed by questions of authorship and culture.”

*—**Mark Gallagher*, author of /Tony Leung Chiu-Wai/ (2018) and /Another 
Steven Soderbergh Experience: Authorship and Contemporary Hollywood/ (2013)

**

**

“In /The Sensuous Cinema of Wong Kar-wai/, Gary Bettinson reprioritises 
the principles of film poetics in a brilliant account of the director’s 
“aesthetic of disturbance.” This book is a methodological breakthrough 
in the study of one of Hong Kong cinema’s most prominent auteurs.”

*—**Vivian P.Y. Lee*, author of /Hong Kong Cinema since 1997: the 
Post-nostalgic Imagination/ (2009)

“A groundbreaking study of one of the world’s more original film auteurs 
in recent decades. Analyzing carefully the films as /films /first and 
foremost – not merely as cultural emblems or allegories – Bettinson 
provides a deeper understanding of the multifaceted complexities of Wong 
Kar-wai’s dazzling yet mystifying oeuvre.”

*—**James Udden*, author of /No Man an Island: The Cinema of Hou 
Hsiao-hsien/ (2017)

*Endorsements for the 1^st  edition:*

“Gary Bettinson’s /Sensuous Cinema of Wong Kar-wai/ is a major step 
forward in our understanding of this director. Bettinson scrutinizes 
Wong’s unique place in world film culture, his unusual production 
methods, and his debts to several cinematic traditions, both Asian and 
European. A close examination of Wong’s style shows, in unprecedented 
depth, how these lyrical, apparently loosely-constructed films are 
underpinned by a strong formal and emotional coherence. The result is an 
unequaled study of a filmmaker whose work, from /As Tears Go By/ to /The 
Grandmaster/, has redefined contemporary cinema.”
*—David Bordwell*, University of Wisconsin–Madison


“In this carefully written study, Gary Bettinson offers a critical 
assessment not only of the stylistic features of Wong Kar-wai’s films 
but also of the scholarship that has developed around them. Arguing 
against the facile culturalism that tends to dominate such scholarship, 
this book does full justice to Wong’s cinematic methods in a series of 
impressively well-informed and informative readings.”
*—Rey Chow,* Duke University
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